Female orgasm: Myths, facts and controversies

Abstract

Summary In this article, we propose a review of data from scientific, anatomic, physiological and clinical literature, combined with sociological and historic data, with a view to providing a holistic picture of our knowledge of the subject. We will particularly focus on the growth of our scientific knowledge and how it is structured, in parallel to the changes that have taken place in cultural and historic factors related to our representations of the female orgasm. Controversies on the subject of female sexuality and the nature of the female orgasm are still present today, after mobilising feminists for more than half a century. You can almost follow the recent history of women in the progression of heated debate that has taken place over nearly two centuries about the nature of the female climax; vaginal or clitoridian. After the domination of vaginal orgasm at the end of the 19th century and early into the 20th, the supremacy of the clitoris became the cornerstone of feminist struggles; the symbol of social and sexual emancipation for women in the second half of the 20th century. There are still many areas of the female orgasm that are unclear today, in particular the existence of the G-Spot and female ejaculation, which since the 1980s have been a topic of much fervent debate in the media, rendering an objective scientific assessment of the relevant facts very difficult. More recent studies, using modern means of investigation have revealed, in opposition to the classic dichotomy between vaginal and clitoridian orgasm, the concept of clitoral complex and integrated and functional entity at the origin of female pleasure linking the clitoris, the vulva, the vagina, the uterus and the anus, opening up new prospects for understanding the female orgasm.